According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the passenger market’s post-COVID rebound momentum persisted in July.
Revenue passenger kilometers, or RPKs, used to estimate total traffic in July 2023 increased 26.2% from July 2022. Currently, traffic is 95.6% of pre-COVID levels worldwide.
Domestic traffic increased by 21.5% in July compared to July 2022 and increased by 8.3% from July 2019 figures. The surge in demand in the local Chinese market has significantly boosted July RPKs, which are the highest ever recorded.
In comparison to the same month last year, international traffic increased by 29.6%, with all markets recording strong gains. International RPKs surpassed levels from July 2019 by 88.7%. The passenger load factor (PLF) for the sector was 85.7%, the highest monthly PLF for a given international market ever.
“Due to the rising number of travelers, airplanes were packed in July. Importantly, purchases of forward tickets show that passenger confidence is still high. And there are plenty of reasons to be positive about the recovery’s continuation, according to Willie Walsh, director general of IATA.
Markets for International Passengers
In July 2023 compared to July 2022, traffic for Asia-Pacific airlines increased by 105.8%, maintaining their advantage over the other areas. The load factor grew by 3.9 percentage points to 84.5% while capacity rose by 96.2%.
July traffic for European carriers increased 13.8% from July 2022. 13.6% more capacity was available, and the load factor increased by 0.1 percentage points to 87.0%.
Comparing July 2018 to July 2018, Middle Eastern airlines reported a 22.6% increase in traffic. Load factor increased by 0.3 percentage points to 82.6% while capacity increased by 22.1%.
In July 2023 compared to the same month in 2022, North American carriers experienced a 17.7% increase in traffic. For the second consecutive month, load factor was the highest among the regions thanks to capacity growth of 17.2% and an increase of 0.3 percentage points in capacity.
In comparison to the same month in 2022, traffic for Latin American airlines increased by 25.3%. In July, capacity increased by 21.2%, while load factor increased by 2.9 points to 89.1%.
The second biggest percentage growth among the regions was seen by African carriers, which had a 25.6% increase in traffic in July 2023 compared to a year earlier. The lowest load factor among the areas in July, at 73.9%, despite a capacity increase of 27.4%. Africa was the only continent where capacity growth outpaced traffic demand for a second consecutive month.
Source- Travel daily
Link- https://www.traveldailymedia.com/strong-passenger-demand-continues-in-july/